The Invisible War -- documentary coming to theaters on Friday

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/review/invisible-war-sundance-film-review-285506

This movie documents the stories of women who have been raped while in military service -- raped by their senior officers and then ejected from the service while their rapists received handslaps (if anything) and went on to promotions.  The women were debased, degraded, humiliated and treated abominably in every way by the military.  One Marine tried to kill herself because of the shame and degradation she had experienced being raped by her commanding officer and his friend.  Her husband, a Marine officer and Harvard/Yale graduate, resigned from service because of his wife's treatment. Both are completely disillusioned and disheartened, knowing the military is not what they thought it was.  Several women's stories are given in this movie, which should be seen by all people (men and women) contemplating a military career. 

God bless these women for coming forward after years of the harshest treatment one could imagine from the military they entered as trusting souls...and left as demoralized and disillusioned wrecks suffering from PTSD.  This documentary exposes the military as the giant cult that it is, just like the Catholic Church, determined to keep quiet what they don't want you to know, but continuing and justifying the abuses under the cover of "protecting the organization."  Because of the way the military is set up, with a hierarchy that can never be challenged by the lowly soldiers, just like the Catholic Church, it became a cult despite some of the more well-intentioned members of its hierarchy. 

Whenever power becomes absolute, as it is in the military and the Church, there are always going to be sociopaths who will rise to the top and relentlessly exert that power over the underlings. As a whole, we humans have not risen in consciousness to a level where the good of the individuals in the group would be of first consideration and power lust would be unthinkable.  As a result of our overall low consciousness, we see everywhere in our society the proliferation of a social/corporate/organizational caste system that rewards the highest rung members and punishes those on the lowest rung.  It's what we call "human nature."  The only way this will change is by each person's raising his/her own consciousness level.  That could take eons, but may be helped along by worldwide disasters (Fukushima radiation, global warming, etc.) that take out large portions of humanity, giving those who remain a hard lesson and a chance to grow together in consciousness. 

From one of the online reviews, of which there are many  (this one by Daniel Feinberg):

"The Invisible War" begins with a string of recruitment ads wooing women to the armed services through the decades. We're then introduced to a series of women who describe the circumstances -- all positive, whether family tradition, duty or the desire to test their limits -- that brought them into the Army, the Navy, the Air Force, the Marines or the Coast Guard. These are women who chose to make commitments to the military and believed in the cause of defending and fighting for the country.

 

But then the testimonials begin. One after another, the interview subjects describe how they were sexually assaulted, how their patriotic dreams became nightmares and how the military was unable to keep them safe or, in most cases, to punish the perpetrators. 

 

In one of many damning statistics interspersed throughout the documentary, we're told that 20 percent of all servicewomen were assaulted during their service. Even more upsetting, we're told that more than 80 percent of victims don't report their assaults and that even among the reported incidents only 21 percent go to trial.

 

As with Dick's Catholic church expose "Twist of Fate," "The Invisible War" is a chronicle of institutional failings in the face of sexual scandal. In this military contest, sexual assault is a crime that carries great stigma in the military, but too often that stigma is turned on the women, who have to make their reports to commanding officers who are sometimes the perpetrators, often friends with the perpetrators and often reticent to weaken their units. It's a culture in which masculinity is prized and boys-will-be-boys attitudes abound, creating circumstances in which a woman allegedly raped by a married colleague can be charged with adultery and in which the accuser is more likely to be forced out of the service after making the accusation than the accused. Dick has dozens of subjects willing to go on-camera in "The Invisible War," which is a remarkable achievement, but the only active duty servicewoman admitting to being assaulted is featured only in silhouette and with her voice modified.

 

If the only achievement in "The Invisible War" were giving faces and voices and visibility to this invisible conflict, that would be of substantial value. In addition to making the subjects comfortable enough to appear on camera, Dick and fellow producer Amy Ziering got amazing frankness and expertly crafted heartbreaking narratives around several of the subjects, bringing several of the stories together in a crushing climax. 

 

The doc's clear "star" is Kori, a plucky and diminutive Coast Guard veteran whose jaw was damaged in an act of violence that preceded her rape. Because  the injury occurred outside of what is considered a conventional military context, Kori is struggling to make the VA pay for the surgery she needs. She's also struggling with PTSD from the incident, while trying to maintain her marriage to Rob, who may be the world's most understanding man, but who's also in over his head here. One sequence of Kori and Rob sharing a couch and fighting off tears while describing their strained relationship is just one of a dozen moments practically guaranteed to reduce viewers to tears.

 

It's also hard not to be captivated by Myla, a former CID sergeant with her own assault history, or Trina, whose posting in Alaska became a cycle of unpunished druggings and rapes. Dick holds off for a while, but he also acknowledges that men can be victims of military sexual assault, taking care to emphasize that these assaults, which actually outnumber the reported assault cases involving women, have absolutely nothing to do with the inclusion of gays in the military.

 

None of the perpetrators, alleged or otherwise, are named or featured in "The Invisible War." There are many active military officers who acknowledge the need for change, or at least acknowledge the existence of a problem, who are treated with admiration. The only military figures who are demonized are the deniers, people like Rear Admiral Anthony Kurta or former SAPRO (Sexual Assault Prevention and Response Office) director Kaye Whitley. Even if many or most of the subjects admit by the end of the movie that they wouldn't want to see their own daughters ever join up, Dick's agenda isn't anything close to "Women shouldn't be in the military." He's saying that there is a system within the military that needs fixing and the film supports a number of means to make those changes, including law suit, direct interaction with a number of members of Congress and a host of cyber campaigns that will be set in motion by the movie.

 

I attended the premiere for "The Invisible War" and can report -- entirely separate from my own gut response -- that the US Documentary competition entry plays like gangbusters. "The Invisible War" is a documentary with a chance to make a tangible difference, which is something many films aspire to, but few films ever pull off.

Read More

Great Article about our collapsing society -- and who to avoid (if possible)!

This article should be sent around the world as an educational alert for those who still care about what is happening in our world:

(NaturalNews) By Mike Adams
What the heck is going on with our world? Why are people (often our leaders) such lying betrayers? Why do the most evil people (like Eric Holder) rise to the top of the corporate-run fascist government? Why are homeless zombies eating human flesh?

In answering those questions, I've assembled the five archetypes of a society in collapse. These are the five dominant personalities we all see around us right now:

• Zombies
• Deniers
• Schemers
• Sociopaths
• Protectors

Which one are you?

Check the descriptions below to find out. You may also come to discover the true archetype of your boss, your spouse, your coworker or even your Congressman!

Zombies

Zombies are the brain dead masses, the TV-watching fluoride heads who believe the mainstream media and dutifully vote for the next globalist puppet President. They live their lives without consciousness or awareness, sleepwalking through day after day, job after job, drinking diet soda and eating GMO.

Most zombies are incapable of holding down paying jobs, although a few have managed to find employment at the local DMV. The lower strata of zombies tend to be unemployed and even homeless, wandering the streets and snorting "bath salts" designer drugs that make them want to snack on each other's flesh.

When not snarling at police and barbequing their best friends, these zombies are frequently panhandling at street intersection, holding signs that read, "Out of work. God bless" or whatever text best works to get them more money for booze and drugs. Four years ago, their signs read, "Hope and Change." Change did come, of course, but not the kind of change they had hoped for.

The Zombie population is rapidly growing in America, thanks to the economic implosion and the continued assault on cognitive sanity via chemicals found in food, water, air and medicine. Many gun owners are locking and loading with Hornady's "ZombieMax Ammo" in preparation for the coming Zombie apocalypse. Remember: If it's eating the face off another person, it's okay to shoot it.

Summary of the Zombie Archetype:
Cognitive capabilities: Insane.
Moral compass: Non-existent.
Desired agenda: Self-entertainment.
Worships: Nothing.
Typical dress: Rags.
When you're not looking, they will: Eat your face.

Deniers

With slightly more cognitive capability than Zombies, Deniers are the functional but ignorant masses who live out their meaningless lives in total denial of reality. They can still manage to hold down jobs and even dress themselves, so most Deniers are middle-class working people you might find employed at the local Wal-Mart, insurance company or TSA hub. Unlike Zombies, Deniers can speak in partial sentences and order from fast food menus. ("Idiocracy" speak.)

Astonishingly, Deniers watch network news and literally believe what they are watching. To the Deniers, there are no "conspiracies." All governments are good. Drug companies are trying to help people, not exploit them for profit. U.S. Senators are "honorable" and the War on Drugs is a huge success!

Deniers believe there is no such thing as black market organ trafficking, child sex slave trafficking in the USA, child kidnapping by CPS workers, or government-run false flag attacks on civilian populations. Deniers are completely unaware that U.S. troops literally help grow the opium crops in Afghanistan, that vaccines are laced with cancer-causing stealth viruses, or that the so-called "fluoride" dumped into the municipal water supply is actually a deadly cocktail of industrial chemicals and neurotoxic heavy metals.

Deniers like to think of themselves as "trendy" and they worship trendy pop culture figures like Steve Jobs. Deniers are driven primarily by the desire to be assimilated into the group think by speaking, behaving and even dressing exactly like everyone else around them. Their need for social acceptance outweighs their need for critical thinking. To them, individuation is horrifying.

As a result, Deniers have become surprisingly competent at burying their heads in the sand and pretending no problems exist, even while they are being soft-killed by the governments and corporations all around them. What, me worry? What global debt Ponzi scheme? What national debt? What Fukushima fallout? Look, another football game is on! Another TV show is on! My girlfriend is texting me! Who has time for reality when living in a delusional world is so entertaining and trendy?

Summary of the Denier Archetype:
Cognitive capabilities: Medium-Low.
Moral compass: Malleable. Does whatever the group tells them.
Desired agenda: Get along and fit in. Be popular.
Worships: Material wealth. Fashion. Cars.
Typical dress: Business casual.
When you're not looking, they will: Spread false gossip about you.

Sociopaths

Sociopaths are the heavy-metals-poisoned, brain-fried human monsters who rage through society, threatening others, running scams and committing fraud. They are the quacks, the hucksters, and the killers. In the medical industry, they're the doctors who enjoy delivering electroshock therapy to children. In the dental industry, they're the dentists who put patients under with anesthesia and then rape them in their chairs. In the natural health industry, they're the hollow-eyed monsters selling toxic "miracle" products that poison your brain with aluminum or mercury.

Do not confuse Sociopaths with Zombies. Sociopaths are usually brilliant wordsmiths and often acquire powerful skills of social influence. Many are even able to attract a kind of cult following, which they often exploit for their own mass death agendas (Jim Jones, Charles Manson, Marshall Applewhite, etc) ( http://www.naturalnews.com/036112_sociopaths_cults_influence.html).

Sociopaths are completely incapable of feeling remorse, compassion, guilt or shame. This allows them a surprising tactical advantage for gaining power in both the corporate and government worlds, where being a backstabbing psychopath is the fastest way to get ahead. This is why Sociopaths often rise to the top of government agencies and globalist corporations.

Sociopaths are fantastic liars. They lie just as easily as putting on a pair of sock in the morning. They lie so well that they often fool themselves into thinking they are telling the truth. Their lies are skillfully woven around a tiny shred of proof to make them believable. Sociopaths believe that whatever they say becomes reality merely because they say it. Weak-willed people are easily fooled into thinking that sociopaths are "gurus" or prophets.

Roughly 4% of the U.S. population are sociopaths. There's even a book written about this: The Sociopath Next Door. ( http://www.amazon.com/Sociopath-Next-Door-Martha-Stout/dp/0767915828) It says:

In The Sociopath Next Door, Harvard psychologist Martha Stout reveals that a shocking 4 percent of ordinary people -- one in twenty-five -- has an often undetected mental disorder, the chief symptom of which is that that person possesses no conscience. He or she has no ability whatsoever to feel shame, guilt, or remorse. One in twenty-five everyday Americans, therefore, is secretly a sociopath. They could be your colleague, your neighbor, even family. And they can do literally anything at all and feel absolutely no guilt.

How do we recognize the remorseless? One of their chief characteristics is a kind of glow or charisma that makes sociopaths more charming or interesting than the other people around them. They're more spontaneous, more intense, more complex, or even sexier than everyone else, making them tricky to identify and leaving us easily seduced. Fundamentally, sociopaths are different because they cannot love. Sociopaths learn early on to show sham emotion, but underneath they are indifferent to others' suffering. They live to dominate and thrill to win.

Sociopaths are found everywhere. Bad cops are Sociopaths with a badge. Many regulations agencies are staffed with power-tripping Sociopaths who get off on the misuse of their power (TSA being the classic example).

Sociopaths almost always have a history of child abuse, and / or mutilating small animals.

Summary of the Sociopath Archetype:
Cognitive capabilities: High.
Moral compass: Chaotic. Varies wildly from saintly to demonic.
Desired agenda: Mass death.
Worships: Himself.
Typical dress: "New Agey" or ragged clothing.
When you're not looking, they will: Molest your daughter.

Schemers

Schemers are plotting mid-level minions (and sometimes high-level achievers) who make up the bulk of government, finance and war industries. These are the people who scam you out of your pensions, steal trillions through the criminally-run banking system, bribe their way into positions of influence and often end up running the world's most powerful organizations right alongside Sociopaths. You'll find them at the top of drug companies, weapons manufacturers, spy grid technology giants and of course governments.

Schemers are different from Sociopaths in that Schemers are not insane... they're just evil. They tend to be very intelligent, very well educated (Harvard, Yale, etc.) and extremely well-connected into the corporate and government elitist circles. Their code of ethics only applies to their own family members, but anyone outside their immediate family is fair game for scams, threats and even murders. Organized mobs and Chicago-style gangs are all led by high-level Schemers.

Today, Schemers run the worlds of banking and finance. Bilderbergers are Schemers. The Fed is run by Schemers. They will introduce new products that kill your babies if it earns them an extra nickel on their share price. Schemers routinely conduct insider trading scams to steal money from honest investors. Enron was run entirely by Schemers.

Schemers will exploit loopholes, flaunt the law, conspire with others and then stab them in the back after their usefulness is spent. Virtually all politicians are schemers. Eric Holder is a classic Schemer, as was Clinton. All high-level members of secret societies are schemers. The Rockefellers and the so-called "global elite" are all schemers. The world is dominated by schemers because they plan ahead, they conspire, they work in darkness, and they relentlessly seek power and control. Schemers are experts at manipulating Deniers and encouraging Sociopaths.

Summary of the Schemer Archetype:
Cognitive capabilities: High.
Moral compass: Loyal to blood and family, cares nothing about everyone else.
Desired agenda: Total domination by any and all means.
Worships: Power and control, weird rituals, occult symbolism, money.
Typical dress: $2,000 business suit.
When you're not looking, they will: Steal your pension.

Protectors

Protectors are the honest citizens in society; the people who actually give a damn about others. They are the truth seekers and truth-tellers. They know the difference between wrong and right, and when they see something wrong, they actively seek to expose it.

Protectors are the modern-day info-warriors; the defenders of the village. They are the liberty movement advocates, the whistleblowers and the independent thinkers.

Protectors are also preparedness strategists. They enjoy being safe and well prepared for an unknown future. They help protect their children, their families, and sometimes their entire communities from uncertainty. They are survivors.

Protectors are long-term thinkers who want to leave behind a better world for their children. They advocate total transparency in government and fight for honest labeling of GMO foods. They're strong advocates for true environmental protection, and they fight against criminal corporations. They demand accountability from others just as they do from themselves.

Protectors are loyal friends, capable defenders of life and property, and often surprisingly well versed in realms of spirituality, ethics and practical life skills. Many Protectors are members of churches or spiritual organizations, but they may also be journalists, self defense instructors, truck drivers or open-source technology advocates.

Beware of false Protectors who are actually Sociopaths pretending to be Protectors. Many Schemers also attempt to act like Protectors by running non-profits and foundations that are actually designed to further dominate humanity.

Only about 2% of the population are true Protectors. You can't normally identify them until they are tested in a real crisis.

Summary of the Protector Archetype:
Cognitive capabilities: Varies widely.
Moral compass: Follows the Golden Rule. Often has a religious or spiritual background. Strong moral compass, strong sense of identity, purpose and self esteem.
Desired agenda: Ending suffering. Restoring liberty, justice, peace.
Worships: A universal force of good: God, karma or other spiritual force.
Typical dress: Varies widely.
When you're not looking, they will: Secretly donate food to the local food bank.

Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/036159_zombies_sociopaths_deniers.html#ixzz1xh3uEEsB

Read More

Great "REWRITE" by Lawrence O'Donnell (a Catholic)

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/06/13/msnbc-host-hammers-catholic-church-over-masturbation-statement/

Isn't it ironic/disgusting that the Vatican kept hidden for decades the sexual abuse of children by priests -- and yet are condemning masturbation as sinful?  More power to Sister Margaret Farley!  I'm glad her book has now become a best seller because of the Vatican's statements against it (~.~).  The Catholic Church is in dire need of a makeover in the Fresh Breeze style started by Pope John XXIII -- but Pope Ratzinger is desperately trying to return the Church to the Dark Ages and the Inquisition.  He and his right wing ultra-conservative cohorts are bringing the Church down by their hypocrisy as they sit in their opulent surroundings, unconcerned with the hardships and suffering around them, while it is the "disobedient" nuns who are truly carrying out the teachings of Christ by caring for the poor among us.

This Lawrence O'Donnell rewrite is well worth watching for all the truth it contains.  http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2012/06/13/msnbc-host-hammers-catholic-church-over-masturbation-statement/ 

Read More

Best article I've read in a long time

http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/david-michael-green/43699/broken-shards-of-the-heart

The Readers' comments are all intelligent, too.  Entire article and comments should be read and digested by those who are concerned for the direction our country is heading.  I agree with everything the author, David M. Green, says.  It is sad beyond measure that our country has been ravaged by the elite for their own purposes.  Worst of all, their plans have been helped along by the right wing voters who obviously know not what they do. (And you can't teach them anything, either. If they even read this article, they will not realize the truth or import of it. They live in a bubble of faux news and lies funded by Fox and the Koch Brothers and wouldn't recognize truth if it walked up and hit them in the face. Which it is doing...but they will blame everyone but themselves as the s--t hits the fan).

EXCERPT:

We had to endure the travesty of Bush versus Gore, one of the most egregious tramplings of democratic practice imaginable, then watch the sickening product of that judicial rape: the swaggering wars based on lies, the torture, the doubling of the national debt, the environmental depredations, the economic melt-down, and the raison-d’etre for it all: the radical shifting of wealth from the 300 million of us to the one-tenth of one percent who own everything in sight.

Perhaps most emotionally devastating of all – Et tu, Brute? – we’ve suffered the betrayal these last years of another Democratic sell-out, a supposedly liberal-if-not-socialist president actually so conservative and so sold-out that he couldn’t even bear to pursue his own personal interest sufficiently to produce a successful presidency, but has rather continued and amplified the worst characteristics of the open sore that was the Bush presidency, even in the midst of crisis opportunities not seen since the 1930s.

So, no, by this time, my heart was not really broken when my former home-state, Wisconsin, voted emphatically to commit suicide this week. But only because there’s so little of that heart left to break. Shards here and there were crushed and extinguished, to be sure, but I am becoming rapidly beyond caring about the country I live in, a place and a people so determined to get it wrong at every juncture imaginable. At some point, don’t you just have to stop trying and let the substance-abuser finish the job on their own?

This country is dying, let’s be clear. It may live yet. It may survive for decades in slow decline. It may find a way in utter crisis to throw off, before it is too late, the fat slimy boa which is squeezing every last cent of value out of it. Its political class may invent a devastating foreign crisis with massively grim consequences in order to deflect public attention from its manifest failings. Maybe it will even be some combination of all of the above.

For rest of article, go to: http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/david-michael-green/43699/broken-shards-of-the-heart

 

Read More

JFK Revelations: Excerpts from new book OFFICIAL STORIES

http://theintelhub.com/2012/06/08/jfk-revelations-excerpt-from-new-book-official-stories/

Very interesting. I've read this information before, but I'll bet most people have not.

Read More

14 YEAR OLD BIGOT'S RADIO SHOW TAKEN OFF AIR

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/06/08/caiden-cowger-program-pulled-spreaker_n_1582108.html

If the political party with which I was affiliated was filled with bigots like this young man, the Tea Party crowd, and the so-called "Christian" ministers who are preaching hatred against gays and blacks, I would immediately know I was in the wrong party--and would leave it PRONTO!  The Democrats are far from good, but the Republicans own the bad and the ugly.

I watched a clip from the movie South Pacific on a PBS biography of Oscar Hammerstein last night.  Hammerstein was a liberal thinker, a man without prejudice -- and he made many heartfelt statements against bigotry in his lyrics in several of the musicals written by him and Richard Rodgers.  The South Pacific song's lyrics are particularly poignant and unfortunately true.  John Kerr as Lt. Cable sang the lyrics in the movie. You can see/hear him in this short online video clip: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HnY-Ft7F9eo&feature=related

For 14-year-old rightwinger Caiden Cowger it's too late -- he's already been carefully taught to hate all the people his relatives hate. Yes, he's been carefully taught and he's oh so ready to judge, condemn and vilify.  Thankfully, his radio show has been pulled.

Here are the printed lyrics for those who would like to learn the song -- and teach it to their children and grandchildren.  No doubt Democrats will be the ones interested.  Most Republicans can just pass it by.

YOU'VE GOT TO BE CAREFULLY TAUGHT

You've got to be taught
To hate and fear,
You've got to be taught
From year to year,
It's got to be drummed
In your dear little ear
You've got to be carefully taught.

You've got to be taught to be afraid
Of people whose eyes are oddly made,
And people whose skin is a diff'rent shade,
You've got to be carefully taught.

You've got to be taught before it's too late,
Before you are six or seven or eight,
To hate all the people your relatives hate,
You've got to be carefully taught!

Read More

Incredible singer on America's Got Talent

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/06/08/andrew-de-leon-opera-americas-got-talent-video_n_1580446.html

A young man who has hidden himself under Goth-type makeup and clothing -- what a voice!  Perhaps he's someone who was a woman for many lifetimes and has come back in a male body, trying to make the transition but not completely doing so?  He never performed/sang in front of anyone -- not even his family -- but had the courage to go on the show and demonstrate what he can do.  Amazing talent!  More power to him!!! (~.~)

Read More

A REAL KEEPER!: Flash Mob in Russia

WHAT A FUN SHOW!  GUARANTEED TO MAKE YOU FEEL GOOD!

Subject: Flash Mob in Russia

http://www.youtube.com/embed/KgoapkOo4vg?rel=0

This will make you feel young again--What fun!  Hit the full screen and definitely your sound needs to be on.

 

Puttin' on the Ritz ... in Moscow!

 

What a crazy, delightful, ever-changing world! Who could have thought that in 2012 young people in Moscow would put on a "flash mob" happening, dancing to an 83 year old American song written by Russian-born, American-Jew Irving Berlin whose last name is seldom mentioned there because it reminds so many of the capital of Germany?!!

The "average people" everywhere carry good will in their hearts. When given the chance to sing, dance and celebrate, they laugh and join in.

This is how our world is meant to be, but it has been ravaged by greed and power lust in the 

rich and powerful men who call themselves our leaders.  It is in their interest to keep the "rabble" downtrodden, with noses to the grindstone. 

http://www.youtube.com/embed/KgoapkOo4vg?rel=0

Read More

Classmates: Romney impersonated police officer in college

What a creep! Just the kind of guy you would NEVER want to be friends with!  Romney got his jollies from hacking off the hair of a gay classmate and impersonating a police officer to scare people.  This is the same man who thought it was a good idea to strap his dog's cage (with his dog in it) to the top of his car on a long family trip.  Romney is a strange weirdo -- and Republicans want him to be President.  God help us all if that happens. He is used to being privileged and powerful and always getting his own way.  He and all his equally powerful/privileged backers now want to have their way with our country. Haven't we already endured enough Republican creeps for our President (Nixon and Duhmbya Bush, for instance?)???!!!! Please God, give us a break this time around and make sure Romney is defeated!

ROMNEY IMPERSONATED POLICE OFFICER IN HIGH SCHOOL AND COLLEGE
By Nick Wing

GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney has long contended that he's a good-humored practical jokester who is only misunderstood as stiff and over-programmed.

As a high school student, Romney's mischievous disposition was frequently on display. Classmates told the Washington Post in a piece published last month that this sometimes led him into unpleasant territory, such as the time he and a group of friends pinned down a screaming boy -- who was presumed to be gay -- and gave him a "hack job" haircut with a pair of scissors.

In another questionable display of his inner prankster, it now appears that Romney was also reportedly fascinated with police uniforms, which he sometimes put on to carry out elaborate practical jokes.

According to a report from National Memo, Romney was open about this practice, telling fellow students at Stanford University, where he studied for two years, that he "sometimes disguised himself as a police officer."

According to classmate Robin Madden, Romney once brought a group of classmates up to his dorm room where he showed them his Michigan State Trooper’s uniform.

From the National Memo report:

Said Madden in a recent interview, “He told us that he had gotten the uniform from his father,” George Romney, then the Governor of Michigan, whose security detail was staffed by uniformed troopers. “He told us that he was using it to pull over drivers on the road. He also had a red flashing light that he would attach to the top of his white Rambler.”

In Madden’s recollection, confirmed by his wife Susan, who also attended Stanford during those years, “we thought it was all pretty weird. We all thought, ‘Wow, that’s pretty creepy.’ And after that, we didn’t have much interaction with him,” although both Madden and Romney were prep school boys living in the same dorm, called Rinconada.

Madden's account of a young Romney who excitedly spoke of his habit of impersonating a police officer, which is illegal in many states, has been corroborated in the past by other acquaintances from the GOP presidential candidate's youth.

A magistrate at Cranbrook, Romney's boarding school, recounted a famous prank in which Romney dressed up in full uniform and a badge, and placed a police light on top of his vehicle in order to pull over a car full of friends on a double date.

The story has also been told in the book The Real Romney as well as by fellow students of the future Massachusetts governor.

Graham McDonald, a friend of Romney's at the time who'd helped him plan the joke, explained the high jinks in an interview with the Philadelphia Inquirer:

As planned, Romney pulled their car over, demanded the vehicle registration, and asked for the keys to the trunk - where he "found" the bottle of bourbon McDonald had taken from his dad and planted as part of the ruse.

"He told me and my friend to get out with him, and that he was taking us in," McDonald remembered. The idea was to spook the girls.

One of the young women involved told the Washington Post that she was "terrified" at the time, but that they'd all shared in the laugh after they realized what was really happening.

While the treatment of such behavior has no doubt become more severe in the period between Romney's antics and the present, National Memo points out that impersonating a police officer is a crime -- and a fairly serious one at that -- in the states of California, where Stanford is located, and Michigan, where Cranbrook is located. While some may be concerned about the legal implications of the decades-old acts, the episodes appear more indicative of a Romney who, from a young age, displayed a comfort with power and privilege that his peers have suggested he used to act out in his quest for social acceptance.

Read More

Scott Walker survives recall effort

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/06/06/scott-walker-win-demoralizes-wisconsin-protesters_n_1572827.html

Too many stupid people continually vote against their own interest. You have to wonder if the Neanderthal brain still exists in much of the population at large.  Millions of dollars sent by Republican corporate interests were poured into Wisconsin to appeal to the Stupids with lies -- and it worked.  Many union members actually voted to keep Walker, who has as a top item on his agenda the mission to kill unions.  Now he will go ahead and finish the job he started.  The mind reels when it considers the stupidity of voters who should know better.  You can't cure stupid.

Read More

OOPS - E-mails show Romney championed individual mandate in health care bill

So...on learning this, who are the right wing voters gonna' vote for Now?  The e-mails show that the Democrats in Mass. wanted individual responsibility -- but Romney and the Republicans wanted the mandate.  Interesting how life unfolds, isn't it? 

Read All About It:  http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303640104577436300587354714.html

EXCERPT:  When Mitt Romney left office as Massachusetts governor, his aides removed all emails from a server computer in the governor's office, and purchased and carted off hard drives from 17 state-owned personal computers, according to a current state official.

But a small cache of emails survived, including some that have never publicly surfaced surrounding Mr. Romney's efforts to pass his now-controversial health-care law. The emails show the Republican governor was closely engaged in negotiating details of the bill, working with top Democratic state leaders and drafting early copies of opinion articles backing it.

Mr. Romney and his aides, meanwhile, strongly defended the so-called individual mandate, a requirement that everyone in Massachusetts have or buy heath insurance. And they privately discussed ideas that might be anathema to today's GOP—including publicly shaming companies that didn't provide enough health insurance to employees.

The emails show his aides later came to champion it, even amid uncertainty from some Democrats. At the time, the mandate was a favored policy of the right, with the left instead pushing for government-run insurance programs.

"We must have an individual mandate for any plan to work," Tim Murphy, Mr. Romney's health secretary, wrote the governor and several aides on Feb. 16, 2006, in an email analyzing the latest confidential Democratic proposal, which he wrote was "unclear" about that requirement.

The Democratic proposal, obtained by the Journal, didn't include such a mandate, and instead focused on "individual responsibility," aiming to "encourage individuals to buy health insurance, not go uninsured."

Read More

Something we would never get to see without the Internet!

The Shanghai Expo Closing Ceremony -- WOW!  What an audio/visual treat!  And yes, you do have to wonder, Where Are the Chairs?

WHERE ARE THE CHAIRS Shanghai Expo Closing Ceremony This is China's showcase to the world! Are those lady musicians sitting on invisible chairs? And what about the bells? (How are they hung?) An incredible show! http://www.youtube.com/watch_popup?v=6HfDeTVpinU&vq=medium

Read More

Thought-provoking article

http://www.nexusmagazine.com/index.php?option=com_docman&task=cat_view&gid=31&Itemid=71

This article was written by Dr. C.B. Scott Jones, a highly credentialed retired naval commander with impressive knowledge of ET visitation of our planet.  Dr. Jones makes some surprising suggestions as to how our world should be dealing with the extra-terrestrial visitors.  Highly recommended for curious people with open minds.  If you think of yourself as a born skeptic and are determined to carry that definition of yourself to the grave, you should just save yourself the time and skip it. 

Read More

Interesting comparison of Obama and Romney re. Polygamy

Polygamy and the presidential race

DAVID MARANNIS
Maraniss, an associate editor of The Washington Post, is the author of "First in His Class: A Biography of Bill Clinton" and the forthcoming "Barack Obama: The Story."

For a biographer, the emerging matchup in the presidential campaign between Barack Hussein Obama and Willard Mitt Romney is about as American as it can get. Although the candidates are noted for their innate caution, their family histories evoke a kind of exceptionalism that defines the United States — not in some gauzy and false way, but in the reality of a national fabric woven from exotic threads. Where to start? How about polygamy?

Perhaps it is true of most people if you go back far enough, but with Obama and Romney, it can be said with certitude that neither would exist had their ancestors not lived with many wives at once.

The president's most virulent critics have tried for years to portray him as a stranger in our midst, someone outside the comfortable mainstream of American life; a Muslim socialist born elsewhere, probably in Kenya. The mythology is wrong on all three particulars about Obama, a Christian liberal born in Hawaii, and its distortions are antithetical to historical inquiry, a manipulation of facts for ideological purposes. Yet the real story is colorful enough, and odd in a way that is foreign while familiar. Sit down long enough at any American family's table, and some strange history is likely to be served.

The line of polygamists in Obama's family can be traced back generations in western Kenya, where it was an accepted practice within the Luo (pronounced LOO-oh) tribe. His great-grandfather, Obama Opiyo, had five wives, including two who were sisters. His grandfather, Hussein Onyango, had at least four wives, one of whom, Akumu, gave birth to the president's father, Barack Obama, before fleeing her abusive husband. Obama Sr. was already married when he left Kenya to study at the University of Hawaii, where he married again. His American wife-to-be, Stanley Ann Dunham, was not yet 18 and unaware of his marital situation when she became pregnant with his namesake son in 1961.

The line of polygamists in the Romney family traces back generations, when it was an accepted practice in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. His paternal great-grandfathers, Miles Park Romney and Helaman Pratt, were born in the United States but lived for decades in Mexico. Pratt was a Mormon missionary there; Miles Park Romney left Utah for Mexico with a tribe of polygamous Mormons after the practice was outlawed in the United States in 1890.

Pratt had five wives. Miles Park Romney had four, and 30 children, one of whom was Gaskell Romney. The polygamy stopped at Gaskell, who had a single wife and seven children. One of the children, George, was born in a Mormon colony in the state of Chihuahua, Mexico, although he was nonetheless a U.S. citizen. He was Mitt's father.

For both presidential candidates to have fathers born outside the United States — what could be more American than that? And the lives of both were shaped by evangelizing branches of Christianity — one family doing the proselytizing, the other being proselytized, sort of — again, how American.

All of the Romney men were Mormon missionaries at some point; it comes with the religious territory. Old man Pratt did his missionary work in Mexico. George Romney, before becoming governor of Michigan and a candidate for president himself, took his Mormon outreach assignments in Glasgow, Edinburgh and London. His son Mitt went off in search of potential converts in France. It turned out that neither George nor Mitt was particularly good at making converts during their overseas forays. They proved to be much better at making money back home, and were happier doing so.

As a member of the Luo tribe, Hussein Onyango encountered missionaries early in his life; it came with the cultural geography of western Kenya. This was not Mormon meets African, the central conceit of the popular Broadway musical "The Book of Mormon," which takes place in Uganda. The Latter-day Saints arrived in western Kenya long after the Seventh-Day Adventists.

It is an understatement to say that Mormons came late to a lot of things involving people with black skin. The first evangelist to reach the Obama homestead near Kendu Bay was Arthur Asa Carscallen, an Adventist pastor who grew up in Canada and ventured to western Kenya in 1906, tooling around in an elegant suit and necktie as he peddled the gospel. Carscallen learned the Luo language and built a missionary primary school atop a hill in Gendia, where he taught Luo boys, the first generation to become Westernized. Onyango was one of his students, setting the family on its unlikely path to the White House.

Years after learning English and adapting Western ways, Onyango converted to Islam. He added the name Hussein and lived out his days as a Muslim, although he did not follow all of the religion's strictures. This is where the myth of his grandson being a Muslim, which has no factual basis, took hold. Hussein Onyango's son, Barack Obama Sr., was an atheist by the time he reached adulthood. When I die, I will die thoroughly, he would say. Stanley Ann Dunham, the president's mother, was not religious in a church sense but was spiritual and had a deep interest in many of the world's religions.

Mitt Romney was born into a home where religion offered meaning and comfort. It suffused him from the beginning, requiring no searching. Barack Obama had to find that meaning and comfort. His father was nowhere in his life, and his mother's sensibility, although admirable, left him unsatisfied and worried that he would end up like her, "free in a way that my mother was free, yet also alone in the same ways she was ultimately alone." He had to be his own missionary to himself. The path of his life traced an arc toward home, which he found in Chicago — a community, a black church and a "traditional" American family, one wife and two kids.

---

---

Read More

ETHOS -- Excellent film available from Netflix

Ethos is a documentary made in 2011 -- Woody Harrelson is the narrator.  It's an excellent film; very educational.  Highly recommended.  It is on streaming Netflix.

Read More

Romney Plays His Trump Card--what a joke!

The Tea Party folks, who live in a bubble world called Bizarro Land, have many favorite candidates for Romney's cabinet, should Mr. R. become President. Of course, all of the candidates are bizarre to the extreme, such as Allen West, John Bolton, Sarah Palin, (I kid you not!) and Donald Trump.  Those who support these crazies seem to be serious about it all -- hard to believe, I know, but these aren't "tongue-in-cheek humor" type of folks.  They are strictly black-and-white thinkers, who really believe these are excellent choices, and they hope Romney has the "courage" to choose their list of nominees.  Romney is playing footsie with the Donald right now, hoping to convince the Tea Partiers to vote for him.  What a waste of time and money. The Tea Party types would never ever vote for Obama (a black man--oh god, we couldn't vote for a black man!), so I don't know why Romney is even bothering to court them.  Perhaps he thinks there are some independent voters out there who are wacky enough to think Palin and Trump would make perfect cabinet members.  Doo-do-doo-do, doo-do-doo-do (Twilight Zone music)...  Here's a good column from Eugene Robinson about this latest insanity from the right wing:

Romney Plays His Trump Card

By Eugene Robinson

WASHINGTON -- Donald Trump has said he would be "open" to accepting a Cabinet post if Mitt Romney becomes president. Trump would prefer "a position where I negotiate against some of these countries, because they are really taking our lunch." So is he on the short list, perhaps, for secretary of state?

Don't laugh. OK, go ahead and laugh. Point out that Trump is barely qualified to be secretary of salami.

But then ask Romney why he chooses to embrace and encourage a puffed-up buffoon whose antic self-promotion, once mildly amusing, has become rabid and toxic. Ask Romney if giving Trump a platform doesn't cheapen what should be a serious debate about the future of the country. Ask Romney why he decided to join a huckster's silly sideshow.

In a week when Romney clinched the Republican nomination, his appearance at a Las Vegas fundraiser with Trump -- and Trump's doubled-down insistence that the thoroughly discredited, insane "birther" theories about President Obama have merit -- dominated the political news.

When pressed by reporters on Monday why he continues to associate with Trump, Romney gave an answer that was unintentionally revealing. "You know, I don't agree with all the people who support me, and my guess is they don't all agree with everything I believe in," he said. "But I need to get 50.1 percent or more, and I'm appreciative to have the help of a lot of good people."

This raises two issues, the lesser of which is the suggestion that Romney will accept endorsements and donations from anyone who chooses to give them. One hopes that when he was running Bain Capital, he took his obligation to perform due diligence more seriously.

The greater issue is this: Romney thinks Trump actually has the Romney campaign's best interests in mind? Really? If so, one has to wonder if Romney is too gullible to be president.

The idea that Trump cares about anything bigger than Trump is absurd. In his mind, from all evidence, there is nothing bigger than Trump.

If he really wanted Romney to win, he wouldn't have done an interview with CNN's Wolf Blitzer that deserves a prominent place in the annals of lunacy. Trump begins by slamming a taped introduction as "totally inappropriate" and "actually very dishonest" because it focused on the birther nonsense. He goes on to tell Blitzer that Obama "uses reverse psychology" and pretends nonchalance about discussions of his origins when actually "it's not an issue that he likes talking about."

I should interject that back here on Planet Earth, the Obama campaign did all it could this week to focus attention on Trump and birtherism. The mood of top advisers seemed to approach unrestrained glee.

Poor Blitzer notes that Hawaii has formally certified Obama's birth certificate. Trump contends that "many people" do not believe the document is authentic.

"Like who?" Blitzer asks.

"There are many people," says Trump.

"Give me a name of somebody," demands Blitzer.

"There are many people," says Trump. "I don't give names."

Indeed, Trump refuses to violate the Super-Secret Birther Code of Silence by naming a single person who doubts the facts of Obama's birth. He does pin himself down, however, when Blitzer asks whether "the conspiracy" is supposed to have begun in 1961, when announcements of Obama's birth were published in two Honolulu newspapers.

"That's right," Trump says. "And many people put those announcements in because they wanted to get the benefit of being so-called born in this country. Many people did it. It was something that was done by many people, even if they weren't born in the country. You know it, and so do I, and so do a lot of your viewers."

This is transparently crazy -- and also stupid. It is a bald-faced lie that "many people" -- or any people, far as I can tell -- ever published fake birth announcements in hopes of establishing citizenship. Moreover, Obama has to be a U.S. citizen, even if he were born on the moon, because of his mother's citizenship. Trump needs to hire some writers to come up with better material.

As for Romney, he needs to decide whether Trump is the sort of person on whom he wants to rely for support and advice -- if he's one of the "good people" Romney would be proud to have at his side if he becomes president.

Oh, sorry. Looks as if that choice has already been made.

Read More

Bracing for a hard landing

This sobering article from Scientific American paints a fairly dismal picture of the future, strongly stating we have passed the point of no return on our planet.  It's unfortunate that greed and power lust has won out....if you can call that "winning."

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=apocalypse-soon-has-civilization-passed-the-environmental-point-of-no-return

Read More

the left wing -- what's that?

Obama has carried out most of Cheney's plans, and he's even given us RomneyCare-- so, what could possibly be the reason why he is so hated by the right?  Hmmm.....put on your thinking cap and you might come up with the right answer.

Read More

The Real Reason Why Obama Is Hated

Each person who hates Obama will have to look deeply inside him/herself to see whether Obama's bi-racial genes are a problem for them. I suspect most of them, not wanting to appear being prejudiced, will say, "Of course not."  Yet...yet....it is a question only they can answer honestly to themselves.  There are many in the southern and midwestern states who make no bones about why they hate Obama -- and why they hate homosexuals -- and why they hate anyone of a different color, or a different religion.  These people often refer to themselves as "good Christians." Romney is playing to these people for their votes, walking a line of hatred and bigotry.  There is no doubt he will get their votes.  Though they don't really like Romney or his religion, they would rather have a Mormon in the White House than a black man, even one who is half-white.  These are the people who send out e-mails ridiculing Obama and his wife in dark racist overtones.  It's obvious that their hatred is fueled by fear.  They hate his color, they believe he is a Muslim, they believe he was not born in the U.S. -- oh, the things they believe would fill a book -- and none of their beliefs are true.  But they will defend those bubble beliefs to the death if you provide them with factual truth.  Witness Donald Trump and his kamikaze adherence to the "birther" lies.  There is no way to get these people to look at the truth.  They are cemented into their own belief system. 

There will always be politicians like Romney who will use the fear of the ignorant and the prejudiced to get votes.  Fear makes people easy to control and manipulate.  We've seen it happen time and time again on this planet.  We Earth humans are not known for rapid soul growth.  Jack Lessenberry makes some good points in his column below:

WHY THEY HATE OBAMA
By Jack Lessenberry, Detroit Metro Times

Earlier this month I received a shiny red, white and blue flyer from something called the Save America Foundation, otherwise known as "Patriots in Action!" They want to save the country, which sounds like a pretty good idea to me, owning a house and all.

And they think they know just how to do it: Get rid of President Obama in November. The flyer told me that we have a problem, and that "it is a huge, monumental, fundamental crisis, because Obama, given another four years in office, will effectively destroy the fabric of everything good that set America apart from the rest of the world."

Well, it's nice to finally know why my garage door sticks. It's the fault of that black bastard "BHO," as the flyer calls him. (You'd think they'd prefer just BO.) That quote comes from a Joseph Farah, who, I am helpfully informed, is the "editor and founder of WND."

Huh? Whazzat? Weapons of No Destruction? Turns out WND is short for "WorldNetDaily," an Internet nut-right publication, and Farah is a longtime journalist and extreme evangelical Christian with a degree in communications from a small college in New Jersey.

Farah is a "birther," someone who believes the president wasn't really born in America. No, never mind that it has been proven time and time again that Baby Barack came into the world in Hawaii.

Never mind that his long-form birth certificate is now available for inspection on the Internet. Never mind that a conservative Republican governor of Hawaii has said there was no doubt he was born there. She's part of the conspiracy too. Never mind that there is no way that two poor students stuck out in the middle of the ocean could have gotten anywhere else, especially back in August 1961.

Nope; the irrational just "know" Obama had to be born elsewhere. But that's not the only reason he shouldn't be president, according to many other nuts nationwide, of whom Farah is only one of the more enterprising and eloquent spokesmen.

They also question "his Social Security card, his status as a college student, his adoption by an Indonesian, etc. etc. etc. They don't question his religion; they are all sure that he is secretly a radical Muslim, or, as one chain e-mail I have gotten over and over for years says: His mother's second husband "educated his stepson as a good Muslim by enrolling him in one of Jakarta's Wahabbi schools."

Why, he is so devious that he had Osama bin Laden killed, presumably to throw true patriotic Americans off the scent!

None of this is true. None of these things are even remotely true. Yet millions of Americans actually believe much of this. One survey this year showed a majority of voters in Mississippi, and almost that many in Alabama, think our president is a Muslim.

What's going on here?

Very simple, children, though nobody will say it out loud:

There are millions who still can't stand the thought that we have a nigger in the White House. Sorry for the shocking word.

But that's what they think. I've even heard a very few admit it openly; that's one of the advantages of being an old, white male.

That we have a black president drives them crazy, just crazy. The racists know, however, they can't say that publicly. They also know he didn't steal the election; Obama won by nearly 10 million votes in a landslide four years ago. They can't face that either.

The only way they can cope with this is to believe that there is something wrong with him. He can't be legitimate. He can't be a real president – this all has to be a horrible nightmare that must be purged from the history books, or we are all doomed.

Some of them even believe he is the Antichrist. My favorite moron in Toledo soberly assured me that the Book of Revelation predicted that the evil one would be a young, charming Muslim.

Never mind that it says no such thing, or that Islam wasn't invented till more than 500 years after Revelation was written.

What's scary is how desperate some of these people are. Joe Farah, who ironically is himself of Syrian and Lebanese descent, is a good example. In his warped brain, having Obama as president is having the same effect on us that Gollum's melting down the Ring of Power had on Sauron, just a little more slowly.

"We have no more anchor for self-government, the rule of law and governance through the will of the people," Farah said.

"The Constitution is being rendered meaningless."

Evidently, however, he doesn't think the almighty dollar is meaningless, at least not quite yet. The enterprising Mr. Farah wants us all to send him money – a cool million or so would do – to help put up billboards "to plaster this message across the country so it cannot be ignored." Send him a second million, and he vows "to produce and air hundreds of television ads about the eligibility issue."

Right. My guess is that you'd have better luck investing your money with those rich Nigerian widows who are always spamming us.

Hopefully, the government or someone will inspect or audit the WND's books. What worries me is what will happen if the American people ignore all these voices that the nuts hear in their heads.

Suppose the people sensibly conclude that President Obama is a good man who has done a pretty good job, and instead of destroying our nation, saved the auto industry instead.

Suppose we re-elect him. What will the nuts do then?

Right from the start, many of us have been scared that someone would try to kill this president. Possibly nobody has made a serious effort yet, partly because they don't want to risk making him a martyr.

That may give the wackos more intellectual credit than they deserve. Yet I worry they may become desperate. Hopefully the Secret Service, no longer partying with hookers, worries sufficiently too.

* * *

And, speaking of intolerance: The Michigan Catholic Conference, together with other Roman Catholic groups across the nation, has filed a federal lawsuit against the Obama administration on a health care issue that's not related to the Affordable Care Act.

The Catholics are upset because President Obama's Department of Health and Human Services has a rule requiring all employers who provide health care to have that coverage include contraceptives.

The Roman Catholic Church opposes any use of contraception, (even though most of their members ignore this.) They have plenty of employees, not all of them Catholic, and they say that being forced to cover the cost of birth control violates their religious freedom.

BS. The government is not saying that the church or anyone else has to use contraception, or even approve of it. What they are saying is that insurance plans have to cover the cost of birth control.

There's evidence indicating they should. Back in 1965, in a case called Griswold v. Connecticut, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in essence that contraceptives were a right that couldn't be outlawed.

Denying the right to insurance that covers birth control would be violating the principle of church and state separation. The Catholics aren't having their freedoms violated; they want to squelch the freedoms of others, something the church has attempted for centuries.

Let's hope the courts quickly dismiss this case.

Read More